Britt's Staff Picks


Showing 41 - 60 of 170  There are a total of 170 valid entries on the list.
Book cover for "Sappho"
Star rating for Sappho
Description:
These hundred poems and fragments constitute virtually all of Sappho that survives and effectively bring to life the woman whom the Greeks consider to be their greatest lyric poet. Mary Barnard's translations are lean, incisive, direct, the best ever published. She has rendered the beloved poet's verses, long the bane of translators, more authentically than anyone else in English.
Book cover for "Death note"
Star rating for Death note
Average Rating:
5 stars
Description:
"Light Yagami is an ace student with great prospects--and he's bored out of his mind. But all that changes when he finds the Death Note, a notebook dropped by a rogue Shinigami death god. Any human whose name is written in the notebook dies, and now Light has vowed to use the power of the Death Note to rid the world of evil. Will Light's noble goal succeed, or will the Death Note turn him into the very thing he fights against?"--P. [4] of cover.
Book cover for "Plastic"
Star rating for Plastic
Description:
Relates the near-crisis status of the world's usage of plastic and the environmentally harmful disposal of it through the story of eight familiar plastic objects--a comb, a chair, a Frisbee, an IV bag, a disposable lighter, a grocery bag, a soda bottle, and a credit card.
Book cover for "Blockade Billy"
Star rating for Blockade Billy
Average Rating:
4.3 stars
Description:
"Even the most die-hard baseball fans don't know the true story of William "Blockade Billy" Blakely. He may have been the greatest player the game has ever seen, but today no one remembers his name. He was the first--and only--player to have his existence completely removed from the record books. Even his team is long forgotten, barely a footnote in the game's history. Every effort was made to erase any evidence that William Blakely played professional...
Book cover for "The Martian"
Star rating for The Martian
Author:
Average Rating:
4.5 stars
Description:
"Six days ago, astronaut Mark Watney became one of the first people to walk on Mars. Now, he's sure he'll be the first person to die there. After a dust storm nearly kills him and forces his crew to evacuate while thinking him dead, Mark finds himself stranded and completely alone with no way to even signal Earth that he's alive--and even if he could get word out, his supplies would be gone long before a rescue could arrive. Chances are, though, he...
Book cover for "The goldfinch"
Star rating for The goldfinch
Author:
Average Rating:
3.9 stars
Description:
"A young boy in New York City, Theo Decker, miraculously survives an accident that takes the life of his mother. Alone and abandoned by his father, Theo is taken in by a friend's family and struggles to make sense of his new life. In the years that follow, he becomes entranced by one of the few things that reminds him of his mother: a small, mysteriously captivating painting that ultimately draws Theo into the art underworld. Composed with the skills...
Book cover for "The guest cat"
Star rating for The guest cat
Average Rating:
2.7 stars
Book cover for "Being mortal"
Star rating for Being mortal
Average Rating:
4.2 stars
Description:
Gawande, a practicing surgeon, addresses his profession's ultimate limitation, arguing that quality of life is the desired goal for patients and families of the terminally ill.
Book cover for "Circe"
Star rating for Circe
Average Rating:
4.4 stars
Description:
Follows Circe, the banished witch daughter of Helios, as she hones her powers and interacts with famous mythological beings before a conflict with one of the most vengeful Olympians forces her to choose between the worlds of the gods and mortals.
Book cover for "Milk and honey"
Star rating for Milk and honey
Author:
Average Rating:
3.6 stars
Description:
"A collection of poetry and prose about survival, about the experience of violence, abuse, love, loss, and femininity"--Amazon.com.
Book cover for "Educated"
Star rating for Educated
Average Rating:
4.2 stars
Description:
"An unforgettable memoir about a young girl who, kept out of school, leaves her survivalist family and goes on to earn a PhD from Cambridge University"--Amazon.com.
Book cover for "Her body and other parties"
Star rating for Her body and other parties
Average Rating:
3 stars
Book cover for "White fragility"
Star rating for White fragility
Average Rating:
2 stars
Description:
Explores counterproductive reactions white people have when discussing racism that serve to protect their positions and maintain racial inequality
Book cover for "My brother's husband"
Star rating for My brother's husband
Series:
Average Rating:
4 stars
Description:
Yaichi is a work-at-home suburban dad in contemporary Tokyo; formerly married to Natsuki, father to their young daughter, Kana. Their lives suddenly change with the arrival at their doorstep of a hulking, affable Canadian named Mike Flanagan, who declares himself the widower of Yaichi's estranged gay twin, Ryoji. Mike is on a quest to explore Ryoji's past, and the family reluctantly but dutifully takes him in. What follows is an unprecedented and...
Book cover for "Gender queer"
Star rating for Gender queer
Author:
Average Rating:
4.5 stars
Description:
"Gender Queer is here. Maia's intensely cathartic autobiography charts eir journey of self-identity, which includes the mortification and confusion of adolescent crushes, grappling with how to come out to family and society, bonding with friends over erotic gay fanfiction, and facing the trauma and fundamental violation of pap smears. Started as a way to explain to eir family what it means to be nonbinary and asexual, Gender Queer is more than a personal...
Book cover for "Prosper's demon"
Star rating for Prosper's demon
Average Rating:
4 stars
Description:
"In a botched demonic extraction, they say the demon feels it ten times worse than the man. But they don't die, and we do. Equilibrium. The unnamed and morally questionable narrator is an exorcist with great follow-through and few doubts. His methods aren't delicate but they're undeniably effective: he'll get the demon out--he just doesn't particularly care what happens to the person. Prosper of Schanz is a man of science, determined to raise the...
Book cover for "Moon called"
Star rating for Moon called
Series:
Average Rating:
4.1 stars
Book cover for "Odd girl out"
Star rating for Odd girl out
Description:
There is little sugar but lots of spice in journalist Rachel Simmons's brave and brilliant book that skewers the stereotype of girls as the kinder, gentler gender. Odd Girl Out begins with the premise that girls are socialized to be sweet with a double bind: they must value friendships; but they must not express the anger that might destroy them. Lacking cultural permission to acknowledge conflict, girls develop what Simmons calls "a hidden culture...
Book cover for "The outsiders"
Star rating for The outsiders
Average Rating:
4.2 stars
Description:
The struggle of three brothers to stay together after their parent's death and their quest for identity among the conflicting values of their adolescent society.
Book cover for "Peter and the Starcatchers"
Star rating for Peter and the Starcatchers
Author:
Series:
Average Rating:
4.9 stars
Description:
Peter, an orphan boy, and his friend Molly fight off thieves and pirates in order to keep the secret safe away from the diabolical Black Stache and his evil associate Mister Grin. Soon after Peter, an orphan, sets sail from England on the ship Never Land, he befriends and assists Molly, a young Starcatcher, whose mission is to guard a trunk of magical stardust from a greedy pirate and the native inhabitants of a remote island.